NYC socialist mayoral candidate’s father posted anti-Israel content online

FIRST ON FOX: Mahmood Mamdani, the Columbia University professor and father of New York City socialist mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, has a social media presence littered with anti-Israel comments and praise for radical activists, a Fox News Digital review found.

Mamdani, 79, who Fox News Digital previously reported sits on the advisory council of an anti-Israel organization that supports boycotts and sanctions of Israel, has posted on his X account about Israel on multiple occasions using terms like “settlers” and “colonialism.”

“When all ranks of the Occupation, from the armed settler to the settler state, claim ‘the right of self-defense’, what language is left for those who defend themselves against the Occupation but the right to resist?,” Mamdani posted online on May 21, 2021 as Israel was involved in a violent conflict with Hamas.

Earlier that month, Mamdani wrote, “The resistance this time began in Jerusalem and spread to Gaza, now the West Bank and Palestinian communities beyond. This is not a conflict between Israel and Hamas. We are witnessing something far more meaningful, the birth of the Third Intifadah against settler colonialism!.”

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Calls for a third intifada or a “global intifada”, which Zohran Mamdani recently drew heat from Jewish groups for refusing to condemn, is widely considered by many in the Jewish community as condoning violence against Israel.

“Palestinians have a right to resist,” Mamdani said in another post. “This is a colonial occupation, not a conflict!”

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In October 2014, Mamdani posted a “tribute” to African political activist Ali Mazrui, who Mamdani once co-hosted a panel alongside, according to Middle East Forum. 

Mazrui has a long track record of controversial statements about Jews including suggesting they had “a certain kind of impurity” likening them to “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” and saying they’ve “landed with Mr. Hyde’s evil identity,” Middle East Forum reported.

Past statements on Israel from both Zohran and Mahmood Mamdani have been a focus of the mayoral race with various Jewish groups speaking out and accusing the pair of antisemitism, a charge that Mamdani has pushed back against.

Mahmood, a professor of anthropology at New York’s Columbia University, which has been at the epicenter of the pro-Palestine protests in the U.S. Canary Mission, calls Mahmood a “Marxist” professor who is “known for his anti-Israel views and obsession with ‘colonialism.’”

Mahmood was also one of the Columbia faculty members who donned an orange vest and locked arms in attempts to keep Avi Weinberg, an economics student at Columbia, and a small group of Jewish classmates from entering a pro-Palestine encampment on Columbia’s campus during the anti-Israel protests following the October 7th Hamas massacre. 

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“Zohran Mamdani has built his political brand on the same radical, hate-filled and anti-American ideology his father, Mahmood Mamdani, has spent decades promoting—one that demonizes Jewish people and legitimizes anti-democratic violence,” Brooke Goldstein, a human rights attorney who specializes in antisemitism, told Fox News Digital. 

“The Jew-hatred the Mamdani family peddles is fundamentally anti-American and violates the core values our country was founded on—tolerance, equality, and liberty. Our nation’s strength lies in its diversity and commitment to protecting minority rights. Antisemitic world views threaten the peace and security of our communities.”

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Goldstein told Fox News Digital that Mahmood Mamdani’s “dangerous worldview doesn’t belong anywhere in American public life.”

“It is also a window on anti-Jewish and anti-democratic radicalization that poisons our young, corrupts their minds and steals their souls,” Goldstein continued. “If Zohran Mamdani can’t—or won’t—disavow these beliefs, we have every reason to be alarmed. We don’t need anti-American racist Jew-haters in government. We need leaders who protect all of us—not divide us, or worse, decide which among us are worth protecting.”

Fox News Digital reached out to Mahmood Mamdani and the Mamdani campaign for comment.

Fox News Digital’s Peter Pinedo contributed to this report